r_rolo1
King of myself
Welcome to the 19th edition of the Lonely Hearts Club for BTS. In the Lonely Hearts Club we explore strategies to cope with one of the most dreaded situations in Civ IV ( possibly the main reason for reloads after the military collapse one 
): starting in isolation....
For the 19th game in BTS the choosed leader was George Washington of the Americans
Why George Washington? There was a thread not long ago where it was asked to choose a leader that ,in our opinion ,would be the one that you choose to cope a all random map ( Something like maps from Refar's Random Map Chooser ) and after a thought or two ( I also like the Ottoman UB very much ), I choosed Washington. Why? Wash is Cha/Exp, a combo that gives both Happy and Health from the traits and that , even if you don't have easy access to resources ( like it happens in isolated starts a lot ), helps you to have good sized cities early. Given that Exp also cuts Granary costs, IMHO the synergy is pretty evident....
Other thing to consider is the UU/UB combo. Both come very late in game, but they also have a good synergy and given that isolation, pushes wars to later, a boosted Cha Marine UU combined with a
giving supermarket UB ( that is unlocked by a tech that gives 1 extra naval movement point .... ) is a very useful combo 
His UU.
SEALs are Marines with extra first strikes.... given that SEALs don't have anti-gunpowder bonuses, this extra FS help a lot dealing with entrenched infantries ( the main weakness of marines is dealing with them ). Given the more naval and later nature of war in isolation, this UU normally comes in times for the end of the world's conquer, especially if you beeline industrialism ( that is a nice war tech by itself )
His UB.
The Mall is a boosted Supermarket that also gives from the Hits resources. This has all the possible uses that you can imagine for a huge boost ( 3 Hits resources + Mall + Broadcast towers = 9 ( 10 if Washington ( +1 from Cha + broadcast tower ))) with some food and health in the pack ( UN win boost, mangement of corp based extra pop .... ), but it also synergise very well with the UU, especially with the WW management: distract the people at home while warring abroad ( i really think that it was designed to be that way... ). A player using America can easily shut down research after Flight/Industrialism/Refrigeration and go conquer the world. If you have a Cha leader things are even better.....
The start (for reasons that I'll explain below, the warrior may not be exactly in that spot in your game ):
No food probs in here
in fact , as the Americans start with fishing and agriculture, the big problem is to decide between workboat and worker as first build 
It also has atleast 10 riverside tiles ( strong food and levee potential )and some hills ( at least two plains hills ). It is clearly a strong Beauro strong site.
Again I made a functional scenario ( In that regard I must say a thing: free techs for both AI and humans are not kicking in, and that makes that AI in higher levels starts with warrior/scouts instead of archers ( with the correct numbers. Settlers/workers are working well ) . That is not a issue of my scenarios , but of the way the game is coded... the game atributes the free techs before choosing the leaders.... if the leaders are already chosen it simply moves on . And as the handicap file does not specify archers as free units , but simply "defensive units" ( if you give Rifling and Robotics to a AI, it will start with Mechs ) if the AI does not have archery they will get warriors/scouts ( depends on hunting ) instead. In isolation that is a minor issue ( you can't rush ), so I took the decison of letting things to stay this way, because the correction would need to change the game code, a thing that is not exactly my objective with this games ) ).... All the speeds are working well ( no more games ending in 1900 ) The save is zipped... you only have to unzip this to the worldbuilder saves or for the PublicMaps folder ( either one will do ) and load it from the scenarios.
Any problem PM me...
Again a small request ( not mandatory ) :
We ask the participants to do, if possible, a write-up with the victory save and a description of your game ( strategies, techs researched, wars,...). All the info should be in spoiler tags ( to not disturb other people's games ). If you want ( we would like to ) post reports at this moments of the game:
Checkpoint 1 - when we have explored the island and are aware of what resources it has. Its not so important when this is, but this is a time to discuss city sites etc. Don't look into a checkpoint 1 spoiler until you have reached this point yourself.
Checkpoint 2 - first contact - when we have met all the other AIs. At this point we can discuss our strategy to get to this point and our plans for dealing with them.
Checkpoint 3 - when we are committed to a victory condition (or at least think we are).
Checkpoint 4 - Victory (or defeat).
The last words are to wish good luck to all
. And let the games begin!
P.S We don't have any kind of problem with defeats and reruns. Just play and enjoy
): starting in isolation....For the 19th game in BTS the choosed leader was George Washington of the Americans
Spoiler :
Why George Washington? There was a thread not long ago where it was asked to choose a leader that ,in our opinion ,would be the one that you choose to cope a all random map ( Something like maps from Refar's Random Map Chooser ) and after a thought or two ( I also like the Ottoman UB very much ), I choosed Washington. Why? Wash is Cha/Exp, a combo that gives both Happy and Health from the traits and that , even if you don't have easy access to resources ( like it happens in isolated starts a lot ), helps you to have good sized cities early. Given that Exp also cuts Granary costs, IMHO the synergy is pretty evident....
Other thing to consider is the UU/UB combo. Both come very late in game, but they also have a good synergy and given that isolation, pushes wars to later, a boosted Cha Marine UU combined with a
giving supermarket UB ( that is unlocked by a tech that gives 1 extra naval movement point .... ) is a very useful combo His UU.
Spoiler :
SEALs are Marines with extra first strikes.... given that SEALs don't have anti-gunpowder bonuses, this extra FS help a lot dealing with entrenched infantries ( the main weakness of marines is dealing with them ). Given the more naval and later nature of war in isolation, this UU normally comes in times for the end of the world's conquer, especially if you beeline industrialism ( that is a nice war tech by itself )
His UB.
Spoiler :
The Mall is a boosted Supermarket that also gives
from the Hits resources. This has all the possible uses that you can imagine for a huge boost ( 3 Hits resources + Mall + Broadcast towers = 9 ( 10 if Washington ( +1 from Cha + broadcast tower ))) with some food and health in the pack ( UN win boost, mangement of corp based extra pop .... ), but it also synergise very well with the UU, especially with the WW management: distract the people at home while warring abroad ( i really think that it was designed to be that way... ). A player using America can easily shut down research after Flight/Industrialism/Refrigeration and go conquer the world. If you have a Cha leader things are even better.....The start (for reasons that I'll explain below, the warrior may not be exactly in that spot in your game ):
Spoiler :
No food probs in here
in fact , as the Americans start with fishing and agriculture, the big problem is to decide between workboat and worker as first build It also has atleast 10 riverside tiles ( strong food and levee potential )and some hills ( at least two plains hills ). It is clearly a strong Beauro strong site.Again I made a functional scenario ( In that regard I must say a thing: free techs for both AI and humans are not kicking in, and that makes that AI in higher levels starts with warrior/scouts instead of archers ( with the correct numbers. Settlers/workers are working well ) . That is not a issue of my scenarios , but of the way the game is coded... the game atributes the free techs before choosing the leaders.... if the leaders are already chosen it simply moves on . And as the handicap file does not specify archers as free units , but simply "defensive units" ( if you give Rifling and Robotics to a AI, it will start with Mechs
) if the AI does not have archery they will get warriors/scouts ( depends on hunting ) instead. In isolation that is a minor issue ( you can't rush ), so I took the decison of letting things to stay this way, because the correction would need to change the game code, a thing that is not exactly my objective with this games ) ).... All the speeds are working well ( no more games ending in 1900 ) The save is zipped... you only have to unzip this to the worldbuilder saves or for the PublicMaps folder ( either one will do ) and load it from the scenarios.Any problem PM me...
Again a small request ( not mandatory
) :We ask the participants to do, if possible, a write-up with the victory save and a description of your game ( strategies, techs researched, wars,...). All the info should be in spoiler tags ( to not disturb other people's games ). If you want ( we would like to
) post reports at this moments of the game:Checkpoint 1 - when we have explored the island and are aware of what resources it has. Its not so important when this is, but this is a time to discuss city sites etc. Don't look into a checkpoint 1 spoiler until you have reached this point yourself.
Checkpoint 2 - first contact - when we have met all the other AIs. At this point we can discuss our strategy to get to this point and our plans for dealing with them.
Checkpoint 3 - when we are committed to a victory condition (or at least think we are).
Checkpoint 4 - Victory (or defeat).
The last words are to wish good luck to all
. And let the games begin!P.S We don't have any kind of problem with defeats and reruns. Just play and enjoy
.
plains hill while building a WB to begin, and set research to mining.
.
